Ads Target 5 GOPers During Stimulus Debate

January 29, 2009

By DANNY

ABC News' Teddy Davis reports:

A coalition of liberal groups called "Campaigns for Jobs and Economic Recovery" launched a television ad Thursday urging five Republican senators to back President Barack Obama's economic stimulus bill.

Three of the five senators -- Grassley, Gregg, and Murkowski -- are running for re-election in 2010.

"Tell Sen. Gregg to support the Obama plan for jobs, not the failed policies of the past," says the ad's narrator in the Gregg version of the ad.

Grassley was chosen as a target, according to the group's spokesman, because he sits on the Senate Finance Committee which reported the bill. The other four senators were chosen because "they are moderate Republicans that we felt we had the best chance of convincing," said Jeremy Funk, spokesman for "Campaign for Jobs and Economic Recovery."

"Campaigns for Jobs and Economic Recovery" is spending $500,000 in total to air the 30-second ads during the stimulus debate in the Senate.

The ads will air on local broadcast television in the senator's home states. There is also a national version of the ad which will air on cable in the Washington, D.C., market.

The ads are paid for by a coalition of progressive groups including Americans United for Change, MoveOn.org, AFSCME, and SEIU.